After the German peace proposals of December 12, 1916, President Wilson called on all the belligerents to state publicly what they were fighting for. This demand caused a searching of hearts everywhere, led to a restatement of aims on the part of the Allies, and threw the Central Governments on the defensive. In formulating their replies the Allies were somewhat embarrassed by the secret treaties relating to Russia and Italy, which were later made public by the Bolsheviki. In March, 1915, England and France had made an agreement with Russia by which she was to get Constantinople, the aim of her policy since the days of Peter the Great. By the secret Treaty of London, signed April 26, 1915, England, France, and Russia had promised Italy that she should receive the Trentino and Southern Tyrol, including in its population more than 250,000 Germans. Italy was also promised Trieste and the Istrian peninsula, the boundary running just west of Fiume, over which city, it should be remembered, she acquired no claim under this treaty. Italy was also to receive about half of Dalmatia, including towns over half of whose population were Jugo-Slavs. To President Wilson's note the Allies had to reply, therefore, in somewhat general terms. Their territorial demands were: "The restitution of provinces formerly torn from the Allies by force or against the wish of their inhabitants; the liberation of the Italians, as also of the Slavs, Roumanes, and Czecho-Slovaks from foreign domination, the setting free of the populations subject to the bloody tyranny of the Turks; and the turning out of Europe of the Ottoman Empire as decidedly foreign to Western civilization." The German reply contained no statement of territorial claims and gave no pledge even as to the future status of Belgium.